A Chinese company named Space Transportation has announced that it is developing a “rocket with wings” for space tourism and point-to-point travel. The proposed spaceplane will be fully reusable and offer sub-orbital flights along with rapid transport between two locations on earth. “We are developing a winged rocket for a high-speed, point-to-point transportation, which is lower in cost than rockets that carry satellites and faster than traditional aircraft,” the company told Yicheng Times. It’s not the only space travel company from China that’s trying to get into the very competitive business. Back in October last year, a company called CAS Space revealed the first set of design renders of its commercial space rocket that had a striking rebalance with Blue Origin’s New Shephard rocket.
The space industry lately has been buzzing with activity, despite the fact that it’s still in a nascent stage. A major chunk of the credit goes to the fierce competition that broke out last year between the three major players – Virgin Galactic, SpaceX, and Blue Origin – to become the first to complete a commercial sub-orbital flight. This helped attract the attention of wealthy investors towards space tourism which has immensely helped smaller, cash-strapped players seek much-needed funds to fuel development. Over the last couple of weeks alone, there have been two major announcements around the development of space planes. An Australian company by the name of Hypersonix Launch Systems revealed information on its hypersonic spaceplane Delta Velos that’ll be capable of hitting speeds up to Mach 12. This was followed by an announcement by an American company Radian that showcased its own reusable spaceplane with a turnaround time of just 48 hours.
Although China’s Space Transportation company was founded in 2018, it has some very ambitious goals, which include ground tests by 2023 with the first flight in 2024 and a crewed flight in 2025. In addition to that, the company which also goes by the name Beijing Lingkong Tianxing Technology Co., Ltd. also aims for testing a global, or orbital, crewed space vehicle by 2030. The company’s official website will greet you with an animated video of the space plane they are currently developing. It shows a plane attached to a delta wing attached with rockets that detach after propelling the rocket to a certain altitude. The video even shows how passengers will easily be able to board the spaceplane like a traditional aircraft. The spaceplane will have a top speed of 2,671mph, which means it’ll complete the journey from London to New York in about an hour. Unlike other spaceplane concepts we’ve seen thus far, this one will take off and land vertically. Space Transportation had raised $46.3 million for its hypersonic space plane and has announced that it has already started conducting curial tests.
